Possessor (2020) Escaping the Shadow of Horror Royalty (Review)

Brandon Cronenberg, son of David, burst onto the scene in 2012 with Antiviral – a film very much cut from the cloth of his father’s most celebrated era that saw Cronenberg Sr. crowned as the undisputed king of body horror. One of the major criticisms of that earlier output was that it failed to distinguish itself as the work of a new emerging horror director, instead, it felt like the work of a second-rate David Cronenberg copyist, a weird state of affairs given who we are talking about. Now in 2020, Brandon Cronenberg has returned for his much-anticipated feature-length follow-up, Possessor.

Playing like an amalgamation of Ken Russell’s Altered States, his dad’s own eXistenZ and Christopher Nolan’s Inception, has Brandon Cronenberg broke out of the immense shadow cast by his dad and become his own director? There isn’t an easy answer to that question.

As Possessor opens, we are met by a strange, aloof black woman at a large social gathering, she occasionally mutters strange bits and pieces to herself before events escalate and she stabs someone in the neck and countless times in the gut. Before the police arrive, she continuously says “pull me out”, which she is just before the police shoot her to death. Turns out what we just experienced was Tasya Vos (Andrea Riseborough sporting an off-white hairstyle), a possessor plying their trade of assassination through hijacking peoples bodies. Upon exit, Vos is questioned by Girder (Jennifer Jason Leigh) to ensure she still possesses Vos’s mind and memories and not those of the person she inhabited. After a quick visit to her estranged family, she is ready to get at it again in a hit that includes possessing Christoper Abbott (Colin Tate) and carrying out a hit on Sean Bean (John Parse), naturally, things don’t go quite so smoothly.

Themes that talk of the deterioration between public and private, a fear of bleeding-edge technology and pushing the limits of the physical in squeamish directions are very much within Cronenberg seniors wheelhouse, however, the execution is unique to Brandon. Calling Possessor horror is a decent stretch; it’s nasty, grotesque and unique, for sure, but this is a Gorey intellectual sci-fi – first and foremost. The mileage you’ll get from what it has to say will vary depending on how much you can tolerate the poor handheld camerawork, repetitive & obvious montages and over-saturated colour pallette in its more psychologically curious moments. Get on with all of that and this will be the most significant genre event of 2020, struggle and you’ll start to voice accusations that Possessor is little more than a more stylistically divergent episode of Charlie Brooker’s iconic Black Mirror series albeit with extreme violence.

I hate to compare Brandon to David Cronenberg so often, especially when Brandon himself will want to be credited with his own ideas and successes. However, when there are so many consistents between the two, I keep on being drawn back. This is the last time, promise. David’s work was often accused of being cold, medical and humourless; however, there’s a darkly sardonic sense of humour running throughout his work and the love story of the Fly is about the most moving horror has ever had. Here is where Brandon is finding his own feet as Possessor is wilfully alienating, difficult, slow and extremely violent in many real, disturbing tangible ways that a classic Cronenberg picture is not.

There is no distance caused by otherworldly aberrations and mutations, all of that comes from the mind space in a sequence that gives it that contorted face for the poster/box art. The corporeal violence is grizzly in a way few other films dare, the second assassination will stick with me for months and the climactic face-off recalls a scene in Shin’ya Tsukamoto’s unfairly-overlooked Kotoko – i.e. the one-shot that has ever made me exclaim aloud. I saw Kotoko in 2012 and that frame is still with me in all its graphic glory, Possessor occupies the same rarified real estate. Irrevsible’s brick scene would also be another touchstone too, what I am saying is that the squeamish should stay well away. As a disturbing and unapologetically graphic film, the effects staff deserve all the credit.

Performance is another avenue in which Jr diverts from Sr. Say what you will about Possessor, but it is a ready-made vehicle for actors rather than horrific exaggeration, ideas and mutations. A large part of Andrea Riseborough and Christopher Abbott’s performances are based on the concept of them playing a role which in turn is being imitated by someone else who is, in turn, trying to play the original character. It all plays into the erosion of self-theme with one personality violently crashing into the other which informs much of the better and more interesting second half. It also provides the film with a great climactic scene that manages to pay off the scripts better ideas.

Whether ambiguous or direct, as soon as you understand the world and its rules there is only one way this film can end. Now whether you see that as the work of a genuine, intellectual and creative new talent that has stepped out of the shadow or an overtly self-serious and graphic exercise in using science fiction to spell out the obvious troubling trends in modern society… it all remains to be seen. At the end of the day, this comes down to your patience for a style that aligns more with obscure, experimental sci-fi than the harsher edges of mainstream horror. Me? Boredom sank in a little too soon, a conclusion aided by the conservative way the film viewed sex and the naked body as transgressive.

Thank you for reading Rob’s Review of Possessor

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